Bond fires his gun one-handed, and doesn't crouch very low in the gun-barrel sequence.
Gun-barrel Sequence: Designed by Maurice Binder
Main Title Sequence: Designed by Maurice Binder
Title Song: "The Living Daylights" (sung by a-Ha)

Film Plot Summary

The film's action-packed pre-title credits sequence found the new 007-Bond (Timothy Dalton) with two other British 00 agents, who were instructed by the British Minister of Defence Frederick Gray (Geoffrey Keen) to engage in a war-games training session. Their mission was to penetrate the radar installations of the Rock of Gibraltar, while being intercepted by the SAS (Special Air Service). After parachuting down from a C-130 Hercules for the mock assault, one of the agents 002 (Glyn Baker) was 'eliminated' when shot by an SAS guard with a paintball gun. A second agent, 004 (Frederick Warder) began scaling the rock wall, when an unknown assassin, Imposter 00 (Carl Rigg) above him shot and killed a second SAS guard (# 1 death), and then sent a carabiner (with a note) down the agent's rope before cutting his grapple line and killing him (# 2 death).

Bond chased after the assassin, who had killed a third SAS guard (# 3 death) and stolen a Land Rover (packed with explosives). He wound up atop the vehicle speeding down the one-lane mountain road, holding on desperately as the driver ran over a guard at a checkpoint (# 4 death). He cut through the canvas top and grappled with the driver and steering wheel, when the out-of-control vehicle was propelled into mid-air off the side and exploded (# 5 death, # 1 Bond kill). Bond parachuted to safety from the back of the vehicle with his reserve chute. He found himself aboard a fancy yacht with a short-haired, bikini-wearing brunette named Linda (Kell Tyler). She was a bored female, complaining on her phone to girlfriend Margo about the availability of real males: "There's nothing but playboys and tennis pros." She wished: "If only I could find a real man"). Her request was granted when Bond landed in front of her. With an extended glass of champagne, she asked: "Won't you join me?" On the phone, he told his superior officer that he would be delayed an extra hour in filing his report. (# 1 tryst)

In Bratislava, Czechoslovakia, Bond met with head
of Section V (Vienna) MI6 agent Saunders (Thomas Wheatley) during
a symphonic concert. His mission was to protect high-ranking Soviet
KGB General Georgi Koskov (Jeroen Krabbe), a "top KGB mastermind," during
his planned defection to the West. With his pocket binoculars,
Bond spotted Koskov, and then noticed on stage the expert cellist,
beautiful blonde Kara Milovy (Maryam d'Abo): "Lovely girl
with the cello." Koskov was planning to sneak away from the
concert hall during the intermission. Across the street in a locked
building's upstairs bedroom, Bond readied himself on the balcony
with a hefty Walther WA-2000 sniper's rifle (with infra-red scope
and telescopic lens), stating his preference for steel-tipped bullets
(rather than soft-nosed ones), to be on the lookout to protect
Koskov against harm from a potential, body-armored KGB sniper.
When Koskov emerged from a bathroom window, Bond spotted an enemy
sniper two floors up in a center window of the concert hall - through
his scope, he was shocked to see that the sniper was the beautiful
cute blonde cellist. He shot and "missed, deliberately." Knowing
that she was an amateur, Bond purposely disobeyed orders from an
outraged Saunders to kill her, only aiming at the gun in her hand
to disarm her. Koskov fled to the same building across the street,
where Saunders and Bond led the defecting KGB agent to an automobile.
Bond drove Koskov to the Czech-Austrian border, where he was literally
'shot' across through the Trans-Siberian natural gas pipeline in
a modified PIG (Pipeline Inspection Gauge, or scouring plug to
clean out the pipeline) designed to carry a man.

Gadgets-master "Q" (Desmond Llewelyn) assisted Koskov when the capsule arrived across the border in Austria, where he was then flown in a Harrier jump-jet to England. As Saunders and 007 crossed the border by car, the MI6 agent vowed to file a formal complaint against Bond for dereliction of duty. Bond disagreed: "I only kill professionals. That girl didn't know one end of her rifle from the other...Whoever she was, I must've scared the living daylights out of her." At Universal Exports headquarters in London, the latest news was the Russian General's defection. "Q" reviewed database files of all the KGB female assassins, but the blonde cellist wasn't one of them. Bond requested that pretty bespectacled secretary Miss Moneypenny (Caroline Bliss in her first appearance) to ask that Records monitor all Czech publication and news services for mention of a conservatoire female cellist in Bratislava. Miss Moneypenny vainly proposed that "music-lover" Bond stop by to listen to her Barry Manilow collection.

Bond was summoned by his boss M (Robert Brown) to the Blayden safe house, a rural countryside manor where Koskov was being held, and along the way picked up a parcel at Harrod's. As he arrived, the local milkman was garrotted by a Walkman cord (# 6 death) from an unknown international assassin (later identified as Necros (Andreas Wisniewski)). A revolving rake at the safe house entrance signaled that Bond was carrying a weapon, and it was confiscated. In the drawing room where a debriefing was being held with Koskov, Bond delivered the parcel - a food basket with caviar and a bottle of Bollinger R.D. for the General's expensive tastes. To M and the Minister of Defence, Koskov described the reason for his defection. His new KGB superior officer General Leonid Pushkin (John Rhys-Davies) in Moscow had replaced General Gogol (Walter Gotell) (from previous films) - now transferred to the Soviet Foreign Service. According to Koskov, Pushkin had adopted a revived anti-detente policy, a secret directive dubbed Smiert Spionom - "Death to Spies" - it was an assassination campaign to target British and American agents. Planting more doubts, Koskov warned the new policy would lead to mutual assassinations: "Soviet and Western intelligence could destroy each other. God forbid, this might lead to nuclear war." The ruthless and charming rogue Koskov advised that Pushkin could be "put away" during his upcoming trip to Tangier in N. Morocco.

Meanwhile, cold-blooded, humorless assassin Necros secretly infiltrated into the safe-house's kitchen, impersonating the murdered milkman, and strangled a kitchen worker (# 7 death) - again using the cords of his Walkman device. After a brutal fight against a second security guard who was knocked unconscious, the menacing Necros persuaded security to evacuate the main building, declaring a dangerous gas leak. He threw explosive milk bottles to subdue further opposition from other guards (number of deaths unknown, although two were later confirmed, including the kitchen worker), apprehended a reluctant Koskov at gunpoint, burned the list of targeted agents, and escaped with his hostage in a helicopter disguised as the Red Cross. In the destructive wake, two were left dead (# 8 death), and two were sent to the hospital after the kidnapping. M and the Minister of Defence were embarrassed by the humiliating incident: "We're the laughing stock of the intelligence community." Bond was assigned to 'terminate' General Pushkin in Tangier in two days' time, although 007 believed Pushkin was a man of integrity, and was not behind the operation. He clashed with M over his new orders: "This plot to kill agents sounds rather far-fetched...He's tough and resourceful, but I can't believe he's a psychotic." To assert his authority, M revealed the note-tag found on the body of the 004 agent murdered on Gibraltar with the same two Russian words: "Smiert Spionom." He then warned that 007's name was also on Pushkin's list. [Koskov had persuasively convinced British intelligence that Pushkin was behind the murder of British agents, and that he should be assassinated. And Necros had kidnapped Koskov to also deceive the British.]

Before he left on his mission, Bond received more gadgets from "Q" in his lab: a key-ring finder - activating stun gas after the whistling of the first few bars of Rule Britannia. It also contained a highly-concentrated plastic explosive (activated by a wolf whistle) and skeleton key lock pick. He also saw a modified 1986 Aston Martin V8 (with hardtop), and watched a demonstration of a 'swallowing' sofa. Bond received Miss Moneypenny's report on the identity of the blonde cellist - she was Kara Milovy - "talented scholarship cellist whose arm was injured in a minor accident during an intermission last week." Bond requested travel documents to detour through Bratislava on his way to Tangier, assuring Moneypenny: "My interest in her is purely professional."

In Bratislava, Bond watched as Kara was dragged off a tram by two KGB thugs to an awaiting car holding Pushkin. Bond retrieved her left-behind fake cello case with him to a restroom cubicle, where he found that the case contained her sniper's rifle (with blanks). It also identified her apartment's address, where he met up with her and returned the case, telling her: "I dropped the gun in the river." The KGB had ransacked her apartment, and was tailing her. Bond knew that she had been set up by Koskov as a KGB sniper to kill Koskov - but it was a faked defection since the gun held blanks: "Made the British believe the defection was real." Koskov's defection was a ploy to have MI6 assassinate Pushkin. He fooled the naive Kara into believing that Koskov, her boyfriend, was his friend. They would travel together to Vienna to meet up with him, in Bond's gadget-equipped Aston Martin V8 Volante. After they eluded a KGB agent, she insisted they return to the conservatoire for her cello. When they were driving on a snowy mountain road, Bond employed his car's hub-cap laser-beam to slice a police car's body from its axle ("Salt corrosion"), and monitored further police roadblocks on his police-band radio. Using "a few optional extras installed," Bond activated front-mounted missile rockets under the fog lamps - with a visual display of the missile's target projected on the windshield - to destroy a trailer-truck roadblock in their way. Bullet-proof safety glass saved them from injury as they drove onto an ice-covered lake, where they sliced the ice in a circle around a police car and sank it. Bond then extended a set of retractable skis and spikes from the tires to propel their vehicle, with a jet-rocket booster under the rear license plate, and it sailed down a snowy slope. When the car crashed into a snowbank, Bond switched on the self-destruct mechanism, and they used Kara's cello case as a toboggan to sled down the hillside, and careen through the border's customs kiosk (Bond: "We have nothing to declare").

In Tangier, General Pushkin visited criminal, egotistical US arms dealer Brad Whitaker (Joe Don Baker) at his ocean-side villa, where he had created a "personal pantheon of great commanders" - waxworks-figures of megalomaniac military leaders including Hitler and Napoleon (each in his own image, with Whitaker's face), whom he said were "Surgeons. They cut away society's dead flesh." His hobby was re-creating the world's historic battles with vast dioramas and toy soldiers, and collecting weapons. Sensing his corruption, Pushkin cancelled a recent high-tech arms order with Whitaker, and requested the return of a $50 million deposit within two days (Whitaker had kept the money in his Swiss bank account for 8 weeks), or there would be threatening consequences: "You will find yourself out of business permanently - and Georgi Koskov as well." Pushkin suspected that Koskov was linked to Whitaker in some unknown scheme. [Since Whitaker needed the money to fund a large opium-smuggling operation with profiteer General Koskov, Whitaker arranged with the help of Koskov to eliminate Pushkin - another job for henchman Necros.]

Kara and Bond hitchhiked into the city of Vienna, where they took a carriage ride. She expressed her love for Koskov: "I owe him everything. My scholarship at the conservatoire, my Strad." She was referring to her famous Stradivarius cello, "The Lady Rose," bought for her at auction in New York (for $150,000). She had aspirations to play one day at NY's Carnegie Hall. Bond arranged for accommodations for them in his accustomed hotel, with a second bedroom, and vodka martinis ("shaken, not stirred"). He also ordered two opera tickets for the evening's performance. Later, during a break in the performance in the concert hall, Bond told CIA agent Saunders that the alleged "KGB sniper" cellist was Koskov's girlfriend, and the defection was phony. Saunders believed that the KGB had snatched Koskov back, but the British were only fooled to think that. He requested cutting through red tape to get papers to sneak the cellist out of the country, and affirmed: "That girl's our only chance of getting Koskov back." [Bond claimed that he was tracking her "to see what leads I can get from her."] Saunders proposed meeting Bond at the Prater cafe near the Ferris Wheel at midnight.

Koskov and his 'kidnapper' Necros, guests at the Tangier villa of host Whitaker, were summoned from an outdoor swimming pool to meet with their unscrupulous partner. They assured him that they had convinced the British (with their "best man, James Bond") to eliminate the dangerous Pushkin. Whitaker was worried that the "cautious" British plan to assassinate Pushkin wasn't working, so he agreed to Koskov's suggestion for Necros to kill another British agent, as a reminder or guarantee.

Later that evening, Bond and Kara visited the Viennese carnival (enjoying various rides), where Bond was scheduled to meet Saunders. Atop the stalled ferris wheel, Kara told Bond about her unlikely, fast-developing love for him: "It's impossible. Knowing you only two days, and all I can think of is how we would be together." He caressed her face: "Don't think. Just let it happen" before they kissed. Briefly leaving Kara with the excuse that he was to receive a message from Koskov, Bond went to the Prater cafe. There, Necros (posing as a balloon-seller) had booby-trapped the cafe's automatic sliding glass door mechanism. In the cafe, Saunders told Bond that Kara's gifted Stradivarius was purchased for $150,000 in New York by Brad Whitaker, thereby establishing a link between Koskov and Whitaker. When Saunders left the cafe, Necros triggered an explosive charge that killed him (# 9 death). A balloon floating amidst the glass and carnage bore the Russian words: "Smiert Spionom." When he returned to Kara after the tragic "accident," she asked if he had heard from Koskov, to which he angrily replied: "Yes, I got the message. He's with Whitaker in Tangier." She knew that Whitaker was "a patron of the arts" willing to help her. He stressed they must travel to Tangier immediately where Koskov was waiting for her.

In Tangier for a trade conference where Bond posed as a member of the press, he followed Pushkin as he was driven to his hotel - and watched from a distance with binocular glasses. That evening, Bond infiltrated into a hotel room where Pushkin was visiting his mistress Rubavitch (Virginia Hey). [Her name was very similar to Rubelvitch, who worked for Gogol.] He held the KGB head at gunpoint while he questioned him about how Koskov was blaming him for leading an assassination campaign against MI6 agents (with Smiert Spionom). Pushkin claimed he was innocent ("We had nothing to do with it") and that Smiert Spionom was officially disbanded 20 years earlier. He also asserted that he had himself been investigating Koskov and was about to have him arrested for misuse (embezzlement) of state funds (in Koskov's scheme to buy weapons from Whitaker with huge amounts of Soviet money as downpayment). When Pushkin alerted his security guard outside the room with a silent security alarm in his wristwatch, Bond stripped Rubavitch of her robe, and she appeared topless when the guard entered. The tactic distracted the guard long enough for Bond to knock him out. To test the veracity of Pushkin's account versus Koskov's version of things, Bond and Pushkin agreed to collaborate together on a fake assassination in order to make Koskov proceed with his schemes.

During a speech, Bond 'murdered' Pushkin, just as Necros (posing as a lighting crew member) was also about to assassinate him. Bond fled across Moroccan rooftops and into a local marketplace to evade police pursuit, but he found himself hostage when he hitchhiked with two beauties in a red convertible. They took him to a motor-yacht where Bond was greeted by old friend, CIA agent Felix Leiter (John Terry), who described his investigation of Whitaker. Meanwhile, Koskov and Whitaker had bought the idea that General Pushkin was dead, and Whitaker announced he would signal Amsterdam (in the Netherlands) to ship the diamonds. Bond returned to Kara in their Moroccan quarters - unbeknownst to him, she had phoned Whitaker and spoken to Koskov while he was gone. The gullible Kara had been convinced that Bond was a KGB agent, and agreed to drug Bond with a chloryl hydrate-spiked drink to facilitate his capture. She also expressed her anger that Bond had pretended to love her, and was using her to locate Koskov and kill him. As he became dizzy and unconscious, Bond convinced her that he was on her side.

Bond was taken in an ambulance (Necros posed as the ambulance driver) to a Russian cargo transport plane accompanied by Koskov and Kara (posing as a nurse). They were flown to a Soviet airbase in Afghanistan, with a medical organ transplant container holding an animal's beating heart - surrounded by diamonds hidden in the ice. She had realized that she had been betrayed by Koskov, and confided in Bond: "I've been such a fool." Koskov claimed that Bond wasn't killed, because he was destined to be turned over to Soviet authorities for the killing of Pushkin. He also asserted he was involved in a deadly double-cross ("I have been on a secret mission for General Pushkin to disinform British intelligence"), because Pushkin was about to arrest him.

When they arrived in Afghanistan, both Kara and Bond were transferred to a jail cell after Koskov betrayed her and claimed she was a defector, although he cruelly softened his plan: "I will be compassionate with you and try to have you assigned to the Siberian Philharmonic Orchestra." They escaped (with another prisoner) by deploying Bond's key-finder (the whistling of Rule Britannia tune emitted a cloud of stun gas) and disabling the jailers (with Kara's help) in a hand-to-hand fight. She was overjoyed by their freedom: "You were fantastic. We're free!...At least we're together." Disguised as Russian base workers, they climbed over the barbed-wire perimeter fence using an aircraft stairway. They were soon captured and brought to the encampment of a local group of Mujahideen tribesmen, commanded by their fellow condemned inmate and resistance leader Kamran Shah (Art Malik). The Oxford-educated ex-patriate was told about the plot of Russian General Koskov to purchase American high-tech weapons to use against them. Although refused help, Bond was told he must accompany Shah and his tribesmen the next day to the Khyber Pass during an "operation." Before they departed, Kara professed her concerned worry to Bond about his obsession to go after Koskov: "You dumb, stubborn, stupid...back end of horse...I might never see you again." He assured her - with a kiss, and they spent the night together. (# 2 tryst)

The desert rendezvous turned out to be a drug-deal between Koskov (as a buyer) and tribesmen (the Snow-Leopard Brotherhood), who were selling raw opium, profitably "worth half a billion dollars on the streets of New York." Kamran claimed he needed a cut of the money from the deal to buy arms (to fight off the Soviets). Koskov's ambitious scheme was now clear - the Russian was financing the purchase of opium (in medical supply bags) from tribesmen with diamonds - acquired by transferring the down payment of Soviet money that was to be used for the purchase of a large quantity of high-tech weapons into Netherlands' diamond purchases. He could turn a huge profit in a matter of days (through selling the opium on US streets), and still provide the Russians with their arms. Bond hid in the opium-laden truck which was driven back to the air-base. He helped unload the bags into a transport plane, where he also planted a bomb (with detonation timer) in one of the bags. Unfortunately, he was recognized by Koskov and Necros just before the plane's departure, and was trapped inside the aircraft. Kara, meanwhile, had courageously and bravely ridden to the airbase to save Bond and foil Koskov's scheme - her efforts helped convince Kamran and the Mujahideen to launch a full-scale attack on horseback against the Soviet base (number of deaths unknown).

During the chaotic assault, Bond piloted the plane in an effort to hijack it down the runway for take-off, as Kara drove in a jeep into the plane's open hold. She was pursued by both Koskov and Necros in a second jeep with a mounted machine-gun. As the plane took off, Necros jumped onboard (unnoticed) while Koskov's jeep collided with a plane that was landing and survived the fiery crash. Kara assumed the cockpit controls as Bond went back to the plane's hold to defuse the bomb he had planted there. He was suddenly attacked from behind by stowaway Necros, and they fought to take possession of a knife. At the plane's controls, Kara accidentally opened the cargo loading ramp door, causing the netted drug cargo to trail from the back of the plane, while the two men desperately hung on to the net. During the fierce struggle, Bond cut the netting, sending the bags of opium flying. Finally, Necros was plunged to his death (# 10 death) when Bond cut the shoelaces on his boot that Necros was clinging to (Bond later quipped: "He got the boot"). Bond crawled back into the plane's hold, closed the ramp door, and defused the bomb (with only two seconds to spare). As the plane flew over an area where the Russian troops in two armored cars were pursuing the Mujahideen across a bridge - Bond reset the bomb's timer and dropped it on the Soviets to curtail their pursuit (number of deaths unknown). He then discovered that the plane was almost out of fuel. Bond lowered the loading ramp, and then fired a release mechanism - jettisoning the two of them sitting in the jeep (with seat belts fastened) from the rear of the plane to a safe crash-landing. They watched as the plane did a nose-dive and exploded upon impact.

Back at Whitaker's Tangier villa (where Koskov had retreated), Bond (with surveillance assistance from Leiter) approached the notorious arms dealer, whom he found amusing himself on the ground floor with a Civil War - Battle of Gettysburg war game involving his model soldiers on a massive diorama. Bond told Whitaker that his $500 million dollars worth of opium was "up in smoke" and then threatened: "If the Russians don't get you, the Americans will." Bond was knocked to the floor, where Whitaker sprayed him with armored machine-gun fire. Bond dodged bullets from Whitaker's 80-magazine assault rifle (with a bullet-proof face shield) and then set his explosive key-finder on a bust of the Duke of Wellington. As Whitaker denigrated Wellington ("You know he had to buy German mercenaries to beat Napoleon, don't you?"), the detonation occurred (with Bond's wolf-whistle) - Whitaker was crushed and killed by the heavy bust that fell on him (# 11 death, # 2 Bond kill), and he expired on a diorama of the Battle of Waterloo. General Pushkin entered the room with bodyguards, killing a security guard in order to protect Bond (# 12 death) ("I owe you that one, Bond"), and as he peered at Whitaker's corpse, Bond quipped: "He met his Waterloo." Koskov also appeared surrounded by guards, acting overjoyed at seeing his rescuer Pushkin and claiming that Whitaker had held him prisoner for weeks. In a reversal, the Soviet General ordered Koskov sent home - dead: "Put him on the next plane to Moscow...in the diplomatic bag."

Afterwards, defector and musically-talented Kara was granted asylum in the West, and was featured as a cello soloist during a successful concert performance in Europe, part of a victorious world concert tour, attended by General Gogol and M. The General, now with the Foreign Service, had arranged for an immigration visa for her to freely perform in Moscow. Kamran and some of his tribesmen had missed her concert due to delays at the airport. Bond also hadn't attended, due to being on "assignment abroad." When she retreated to her star dressing room, she was clearly pleased that Bond hadn't missed. He had set out two glasses of champagne to celebrate, telling her: "You didn't think I'd miss this performance, did you?" - they kissed. She sighed, "Oh, James" as they sank behind her dressing room divider (# 3 tryst).

Film Notables (Awards, Facts, etc.)

The 15th film in the series. This was the fourth of five Bond films directed by John Glen in the 1980s.

This was the first of two films starring Timothy
Dalton as a brooding, moody and darker James Bond. [Dalton had
initially been chosen to replace retiring Sean Connery in On
Her Majesty's Secret Service (1969),
but declined due to his young age - of 24 years.] Although future-Bond
Pierce Brosnan was originally chosen to succeed Roger Moore, he
was forced to decline when NBC-TV renewed his recently-cancelled
series Remington
Steele for another season (which
was again cancelled in 1987).

Also, the first of two films with a new love-starved Miss Moneypenny (Caroline Bliss). It was the first change in the Miss Moneypenny casting in 25 years (in 14 films).

Until Casino Royale (2006), this was the last film with the title of an Ian Fleming story.

Regarded as one of the better Bond films with a realistic
and credible (and topical) plot (reminiscent of the Reagan-era
Iran-contra affair), although fairly humorless (without the typical
gratuitous one-liners typical of the Moore-Bond films).

With a production budget of $40 million, and gross revenue of $51 million (domestic) and $191 million (worldwide).

Set-pieces: the pre-title credits sequence - assault on Rock of Gibraltar, the staged defection in Bratislava (Czechoslovakia), the Aston Martin car chase onto an icy lake and the cello-case slide down a snowy hillside to the border, the airborne fight scene above Afghanistan between Bond and Necros onboard a transport cargo plane trailing a net holding bags of opium, the bombing of a bridge to save Mujahideen warriors on horseback from Soviet armored tank pursuit, and the final brief gunfight stand-off between Bond and Whitaker.